 the dawn of a new day, holding the promise of new discoveries, new challenges, new accomplishments, a new beginning. America's space program is moving to its new beginning. It's a whole new world out there. We belong in space. I think the shuttle is the epitome of flight. The people, that's what makes it really all come together. The people are really pulling together. All of us have the kind of pride and the feeling for getting our job done that we're really putting that above a lot of our personal needs and personal activities. These are the people of the Marshall Space Flight Center Shuttle Projects, an integral part of that new beginning. Their job, the redesign and certification of the shuttle's propulsion elements, the external tank, the structural backbone of the space transportation system, the main engines, the most technologically advanced liquid-fueled engines ever built, and the solid rocket booster with the largest solid propellant motor ever designed for manned flight. Hundreds of dedicated men and women across the country, government and industry, working side by side to a common goal. The country space program, assembling the finest technical, scientific and management resources to study and analyze every aspect of the shuttle program. These exhaustive review efforts from outside and within the agency culminated with the issuance of a set of actions from the NASA Associate Administrator for Space Flight. Bob Marshall, Manager of the Shuttle Project Office at the Marshall Space Flight Center, explains. He established the requirements that he felt were necessary for us to have a safe return to flight. These requirements are identified in a letter which he has dated March 24th. That preceded the commission report of June 6, 1986. However, it included the points that were recovered within the commission report. The first of these and probably the more important was a reassessment of the entire program management structure and its operation. It provided the requirement and we have since then established that we would have a program line of communications which are referred to as Level 321 and we'd also have an institutional which is the center directors and the organizations within each of the centers which report the day truly. The second of his of course was the redesign of the joint and the SRM redesign is progressing very well. The third of these was the design requirements verification. There are some modifications being made both to the requirements as well as to the hardware and as to the very verification process. The fourth of these is a review of the critical items list and a review of the FEMA cell or FEMA failure modes and effects analysis. There have been at least three rather significant items that have been uncovered in this reassessment which will help us to make the vehicle more safe. But more importantly, we have identified a number of the failure modes that can be eliminated through design and we are doing that in the critical item one type category. We also are addressing a complete review which is item five of the operation and maintenance documents. These documents are the KSC documents which provide the instructions for the people there to check out the hardware as it arrives from our design center. Additionally, we are looking again at the launcher board and launch flight launch rules. There are a number of those which are not going to be changed but as a result the FEMA cell will be some added potentially that will address final checks to be sure that the category one or critical one failures are in fact well checked out prior to launch. The seventh one of these is the first flight years operations. We have addressed those areas within the operational part of the program that allow us to return to flight and complete our flight assignments like we came out of the last series of flights and have not lost any of the enthusiasm from the people but more importantly any of the knowledge that's necessary for flight. The number eight item from Dick Trulley's letter is the development of a sustainable safe flight rate. We have reassessed that recently and we are now attempting to make sure that we have a safe flight rate that is somewhere in the neighborhood of 14 to 16. The last item in Dick Trulley's letter was referred to as the bottom line. The bottom line to all of us is that we do have in fact an organizational structure staff of the kinds of people in the proper positions that allow us to return to flight safely and maintain the kind of decision trail that is necessary to assure that we don't have another type accident of the 51L. Overall the Marshall Center in my opinion as well as our contractor friends are at this point improved substantially in all of the communications but their outlook and their participation in the program and I believe that as I look down toward 1988 that there will be a readiness for launch we will have covered all of the quote basis, unquote and we will be in a position and a posture to have a flight that is safe and again put this nation back into space. With clearly defined guidelines and objectives each project is involved in the business of returning to safe flight operations. Porter Britwell, manager of the external tank project. Shortly after 51L we aggressively stepped into the reassessment activities. What we wanted to assure ourselves of in reassessing the total hardware on the tank was to assure ourselves number one we had identified all the single point failures in the external tank and secondly after doing that is to assure ourselves from a test verification design standpoint that those were acceptable risks for the next flight of the external tank and subsequent tanks. Thomas Worth, vice president external tank project for Martin Marietta. While the return to flight activities are going on we still are in production here at Martin Marietta Michoud. We are also looking at how we build a tank to certify that that process is correct taking the design requirements how they're implemented down through the build procedures and then actually how the tank is built. I'm happy to say that in review of this process we have found that the process is right and the tanks are built to the engineering. Our scale is 0 to 100 their attitude and their performance particularly in production areas somewhere between 95 to 100 percent. Because we are building better parts out here now even better than before. NASA's overall commitment to mission success is the the overriding factor here and I want to see the shuttle fly again and I want to see it fly safely. Space Shuttle main engine project manager Joe Lombardo. We were feeling quite confident with the SSME as it flew in the prior 25 flights but we saw the opportunity given this downtime to go ahead and through design analysis develop some product improvements and then subject them to ground test exposure. Many many good ideas were developed by the combined government and prime contractor team that is Rocketdyne Division of Rockwell International. We were able to get these changes into hardware get them to the test stand and we started a very aggressive ground test program. Ray Toulander the Marshall Space Flight Center Resonant Office Manager at Rocketdyne. The really significant thing in this program right now is in the last six months that we have tremendously accelerated the test program and this is where it really all comes together. With the SSME we can truly simulate what we do in flight on the ground in each and every test and we can do it on multiple samples and over and over again and through that process we really find out what our margins are where our weak lengths are where our strong points are and it gives us the confidence to get back into flight safely and efficiently. Bob Pastor Vice President SSME Program Manager for Rocketdyne. We have a lot of hardware to build there are a lot of testing to perform we're working hard hours and we're all working together both Rocketdyne and again the NASA team and accomplishing what has to be done before we fly again. All the employees take a personal pride in delivering hardware in an engine that has to perform perfectly every time. There's not only a technical commitment to the SSME but there is also an emotional commitment. The shuttle it's one of the greatest things that America has ever made. Solid Rocket Booster Project Manager Gerald Smith. We're in the process of redesign of the the joints in a solid rocket motor and other parts of the motor that we found where we could provide performance margin and so that's a major activity that is required to be complete as a part of our return to flight. We initially established a team at Marshall to work very closely with Morton Tycall in the redesign of the solid rocket motor. This team drew on a nucleus of people from our science and engineering directorate who had a past experience on the SRB program and then the discipline areas to support a redesign. It's my assessment this merging of the two teams especially the team in place at Tycall has done exactly what it was intended to do. It has allowed a very close working relationship, a rapport to be established between the government contractor team. Royce Mitchell, Manager of the Solid Rocket Motor Project. We recognize there would be many analyses, many tests, many reviews and in order to speed things up to broaden our base of understanding we just brought the people to the job. It'll speed things up, it'll result in a better product. The test program for the solid rocket motor redesign starts in the lab literally at the microscopic level, progresses on through component level, subsystem assembly levels and then finally to the finished product which is a full-scale motor. The full-scale static motor firings of course are the culmination of all our test program. They are the verification that all of our sub-assembly and laboratory tests have led us in the right direction. Carver Kennedy, Vice President of Space Programs for Morton Tycall. This is one of the most extensive development and testing programs I personally have ever been associated with in some 30 years in this business. We believe the program we have laid out and the testing activities which we have undertaken will in fact be successful and give us great confidence that we'll return to flight on the schedule that NASA has established. Gene Cagle, Senior Vice President of Programs and Operations for USBI Booster Production Company Incorporated. We've also since 51L have gone back and made some changes that will enhance the performance of the hardware to get it more reliable and safer hardware and that was really our main goal is become out of this thing with a re-certification program that'll make the overall performance be better and more reliable and safe hardware. I would go on at the month. I mean I'm there confident. What I've seen in all the motors that I've been involved in and I'd love to fly them. I think it's every one of us's obligation to do our best every day on it. We have excellent people working on the program, very highly motivated and we all have a common goal. Let's work toward making this thing as safe and reliable as possible. Just a tremendous period for us where I think taking this opportunity to stop and re-look at where we've been and now we're starting to look at where we're going. JR Thompson, Director of the Marshall Space Flight Center. Everybody that I've seen throughout NASA is very enthusiastic about the program. We understand it's risk but we're ready to press on. Each passing day brings NASA closer to renewed spaceflight operations due in large part to the efforts of these people. It is a marvelous flying machine and I think that that the agency needs it. We're working hard to make that happen. Their teamwork an inspiring example of the human spirit. This is a very unique capability that the country has and we're doing our best to maintain and preserve it and pass it on and I think that others out there and will keep up that heritage. Their dedication a commitment to the hopes, dreams and expectations of an entire nation. I'm ready. Let's go right now.